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Descent into Apostasy

We wish we could say that the last picture Ellen White
portrays of Protestantism is the blessing that it brought to the world in
sharing the light of God’s Word with the common people. However, as with many
movements that do a work for God in the beginning, the churches that grew out
of Protestantism began to lose the spirit of its founders. Each new generation
took another step down the slippery slope of apostasy, feeling less of a burden
to maintain unpopular positions and to keep advancing in a clearer knowledge
and practice of Bible truth.

We cannot detail the history of any single Protestant
denomination, let alone the hundreds of denominations that exist today.
Instead, we will present a sampling of what Mrs. White states are the primary
areas in which the Protestant churches have failed and which will lead to the
eventual complete demise of the Protestant movement.

The Church Must Interpret the Scriptures

During the eighteenth century, the persecution and
opposition to Protestantism diminished to the extent that one could profess the
Protestant faith without endangering his life or possessions or losing his
friends. Thus, many laid claim to the faith who would not have been willing to
bear the cross of inconvenience or unpopularity.

Those who are unwilling to accept the plain, cutting truths of
the Bible are continually seeking for pleasing fables that will quiet the
conscience. The less spiritual, self-denying, and humiliating the doctrines
presented, the greater the favor with which they are received. . . .
Satan is ready to supply the heart’s desire, and he palms off his deceptions in
the place of truth. It was thus that the papacy gained its power over the minds
of men; and by rejection of the truth because it involves a
cross, Protestants are following the same path. All who neglect the word of God
to study convenience and policy, that they may not be at variance with the
world, will be left to receive damnable heresy for religious truth.
. . . The apostle Paul, speaking of a class who “did not receive the
love of the truth, that they might be saved,” declares: “For this reason God
will send them strong delusion, that they should believe the lie, that they all
may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in
unrighteousness.” 2 Thessalonians 2:10-12. With such a warning before us
it behooves us to be on our guard as to what doctrines we receive.

The Great Controversy, pp. 523-524

It was Protestants who made the Bible available to the
common people, and yet they are falling into an error that may be even more
subtle—and therefore dangerous—than that of not having a Bible at all—that of
believing that the church must interpret the Bible:

The Roman Church reserves to the clergy the right to interpret
the Scriptures. On the ground that ecclesiastics alone are competent to explain
God’s word, it is withheld from the common people. Though the Reformation
gave the Scriptures to all, yet the selfsame principle which was maintained by
Rome prevents multitudes in Protestant churches from searching the Bible for
themselves. They are taught to accept its teachings as interpreted by the
church; and there are thousands who dare receive nothing, however plainly
revealed in Scripture, that is contrary to their creed or the established
teaching of their church.

The Great Controversy, p. 596

When a person accepts the teaching that the Bible cannot be
understood by anyone but the church leaders, it is easy for him to look to a
creed instead of the Bible as the definition of his faith. Those who do so are
not ready to move forward as the Holy Spirit reveals new Bible truths:

How did the church first depart from the
simplicity of the gospel? By conforming to the practices of paganism, to
facilitate the acceptance of Christianity by the heathen. The apostle
Paul declared, even in his day, “The mystery of lawlessness is already at
work.” 2 Thessalonians 2:7. During the lives of the apostles the church
remained comparatively pure. But “toward the latter end of the second century
most of the churches assumed a new form; the first simplicity disappeared, and
insensibly, as the old disciples retired to their graves, their children, along
with new converts, . . . came forward and new-modeled the cause.”—Robert
Robinson, Ecclesiastical Researches, ch. 6, par. 17, p. 51. To secure
converts, the exalted standard of the Christian faith was lowered, and as the
result “a pagan flood, flowing into the church, carried with it its customs,
practices, and idols.” —Gavazzi, Lectures, page 278. As the Christian
religion secured the favor and support of secular rulers, it was nominally
accepted by multitudes; but while in appearance Christians, many “remained in
substance pagans, especially worshiping in secret their idols.”—Ibid., page
278.

Has not the same process been repeated in nearly every church
calling itself Protestant? As the founders, those who possessed the true
spirit of reform, pass away, their descendants come forward and “new-model the
cause.” While blindly clinging to the creed of their fathers and refusing to
accept any truth in advance of what they saw, the children of the reformers
depart widely from their example of humility, self-denial, and renunciation of
the world. Thus “the first simplicity disappears.” A worldly flood, flowing
into the church, carries “with it its customs, practices, and idols.”

The Great Controversy, pp. 384-385

The spirit of world conforming and indifference to the testing
truths for our time exists and has been gaining ground in churches of the
Protestant faith in all the countries of Christendom; and these churches are
included in the solemn and terrible denunciation of the second angel [of
Revelation 14]. But the work of apostasy has not yet reached its culmination.